32 | JUNE 23 • 2022
W
hen her younger sister,
Amanda, was gearing up for
her 21st birthday in November
2020, Claudia Halpern knew she had to do
something special to help Amanda have a
memorable celebration despite the ongoing
COVID-19 pandemic.
“We couldn’t go to bars,
” Halpern, 27, of
Farmington Hills, recalls. Instead, she brain-
stormed with Amanda’s boyfriend on how
to throw a party for her sister, despite the
restrictions that prevented them from cele-
brating in traditional 21st birthday fashion.
They decided to throw a small house
party for Amanda’s birthday, but Claudia
knew proper decorations were in order. “I
started thinking about things that we can
do,
” she says. “I was like, ‘Oh, I’m going to
make a balloon arch.
’ How cool would that
be?’”
With a history of working for event plan-
ners, planning her sister’s birthday party
came naturally to Halpern. Seeing the cus-
tom balloon arch turning into a success and
the process of bringing it to life gave her an
idea to start making party decorations on
the side.
It was the beginning of Party Sistas, a
business in which Halpern could specialize
in party design, college bed parties, bar cart
styling, balloon arches and balloon backdrop
kits. She worked with her sister in launch-
ing the idea, but when Amanda moved to
Florida, Claudia Halpern was in charge of
the business on her own and had to pivot.
CREATING JOY WITH CANDY
“In February 2021, I was browsing online,
and I saw someone made a box for some-
one with candy in it,
” she recalls. Deciding
to make a similar box for kids she babysat,
Halpern posted her colorful creation on
Facebook and received numerous requests
to make more.
Could she make candy boxes for birth-
days and bat mitzvahs, people asked? From
there, Halpern realized candy boxes could
be the focal point of her business.
“It happened by accident, in a way,
” she
says. Her style — which Halpern explains
is positive and happy, something that puts
smiles on people’s faces — became more and
more in-demand, transforming Party Sistas
The
Candy
Woman
Through colorful candy, Claudia Halpern
makes stunningly sweet creations.
ASHLEY ZLATOPOLSKY CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Claudia
Halpern
MARLEE JADE PHOTOGRAPHY
NEXT DOR
VOICE OF THE NEW
JEWISH GENERATION